If Judge Robert Spencer is right, the Colorado law that prevents public officials from promoting ballot issues at taxpayer expense is a dead letter in the digital age. Brace yourself for an onslaught of one-sided propaganda at election time, prepared and delivered by the very officials whose salaries you pay.

School districts and other jurisdictions apparently are now free to pepper local residents with e-mails promoting tax hikes that will benefit them directly while those of us who would like to see a more even-handed presentation are left with no recourse.

Astonishing. Yet what other conclusion is possible given a recent ruling by administrative law judge Spencer? He concluded Denver Public Schools Superintendent Tom Boasberg did not violate the Fair Campaign Practices Act when he sent a lengthy e-mail last fall to tens of thousands of district parents and a similar e-mail to thousands of employees that amounted to a strong endorsement of Amendment 66.

The district has maintained that the superintendent’s message was a factual summary of the amendment, which would be permitted by the campaign act. But the judge at least didn’t buy that nonsense. “A factual summary ‘must include arguments both for and against the proposal,'” he wrote. “The e-mails did not contain a balanced summary of the arguments.”

Indeed, other than a fleeting mention that the amendment involved a tax hike, he wrote, “the e-mails made no reference to any facts that would support an argument against Amendment 66.”

So why weren’t they a violation of law? For two reasons, the judge maintained.

The first is that “Boasberg and [communications chief Michael] Vaughn are salaried employees who, as far as the record shows, would have been paid the same even if they had not been involved in preparing and sending the e-mails.” And “their use of the DPS computer system to send the e-mails” cost no more than “if the e-mails had not been sent.”

Is the judge under the impression that a salaried employee who fritters away his day gambling or playing online chess costs his employer nothing because he would have been “paid the same” if he’d actually bothered to work and because he would have been using the computer anyway? Boasberg’s e-mail was lengthy and detailed and must have taken hours to prepare and check for accuracy. And yet the law, by the judge’s own description, allows an official “to spend no more than $50 of public money” in incidental expenses when expressing a personal opinion on a ballot issue. Boasberg and Vaughn are both six-figure employees whose time was worth far more than that limit. And yet Spencer explicitly said the limit was not breached.

Spencer also accepted the district’s claim that Boasberg was merely addressing questions put to him by parents about “how we would prioritize that money for our schools were Amendment 66 passed.”

If Spencer’s interpretation of the law stands — and plaintiffs may appeal — then a law meant to prevent public officials from pushing ballot issues through newsletters, mailings, advertisements and so forth could be skirted by the simple scheme of having salaried employees write and send promotional e-mails, while claiming they’re answering constituents’ queries.

I’ll bet even Denver school officials, who if nothing else thumbed their noses at the well-understood spirit of the law, are surprised by this bright green light.

E-mail Vincent Carroll at vcarroll@denverpost.com. Follow him on Twitter: @vcarrollDP